Abstract
Jesús Huerta de Soto Ballester is one of the foremost protagonists of the sixth generation of Austrian economists. This chapter provides an understanding of his general approach to studying economic phenomena. Understanding this approach is essential as it influenced later generations of Austrian economists. There is now a clearly defined school of economic thought broadly considered to be “Huertian.” This school is distinct in the types of questions it seeks to answer. It is also distinct because it makes links between fields not commonly associated with economics. These fields include ethics, religion, history, and most commonly, law.
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Notes
- 1.
Only a small minority of people, in our experience, know what Jesús’s full name is. Due to some idiosyncrasies of Spanish naming conventions, this group is dominated by Spaniards. To aid the non-Spanish speaker, a brief explanation of his name is necessary. All Spanish surnames are composed of two parts. The first part is the father’s first surname, and the second is the mother’s first surname. The general form for all Spanish names becomes [first name] [paternal first surname] [maternal first surname]. Thus, all children have a different surname than their mothers and fathers, though this surname will include elements of both through their respective paternal branches. The children of Juan Garcia Fernandez and Sofia Gonzalez Martin, for example, would all have the surname Garcia Gonzalez.
Jesús Huerta de Soto Ballester was born to Jesús Huerta Ballester and Concepción de Soto Acuña. His birth name was Jesús Huerta de Soto, and (after marrying Sonsoles Huarte) his children would have the surname Huerta Huarte. With six children, this linguistically challenging surname would have not been an isolated difficulty.
After marriage, Jesús made the decision to legally change the order of his surnames. (This bureaucratic process is not straightforward, nor is it common.) As a result of this change, his first surname, Huerta de Soto, now includes elements of both his father’s and his mother’s names. His second surname, Ballester, is from his father. While the name remains essentially the same (Jesús Huerta de Soto at birth versus Jesús Huerta de Soto Ballester today), the change in ordering meant that the family name passed down to his children would be “Huerta de Soto” instead of “Huerta.” This also applies to their descendants.
In all but the most formal situations in Spain, use of only the first surname is sufficient. Hence, Jesús Huerta de Soto Ballester is commonly referred to only as “Huerta de Soto.” Since this is somewhat lengthy, it is often shortened further to “Huerta.” The reader will note that over the course of the fifty-two chapters of these two volumes, the authors refer to him with varying degrees of formality as “Jesús,” “Huerta,” or “Huerta de Soto.” On only rare and especially formal occasions is his full surname of Huerta de Soto Ballester invoked.
- 2.
Throwing fistfuls, literal fistfuls, of euro notes in the air to illustrate the non-neutral effects of monetary policy is a leading contender for the most memorable moment. Watching students scramble to see at whose feet the thousands of euros will end up makes clear the winners and losers of central bank actions. We can only speculate that Jesús learned this “trick” from his father’s theatre antics subversive to the Franco dictatorship, as detailed in our biography of the professor in this book’s companion volume.
- 3.
Even the negligent reader of Huerta de Soto’s works will notice his affinity for etymology as a starting point to understand the inherent nature of certain concepts.
- 4.
Briefly, the other nine rules of life are (1) be constant and patient, (2) always be the best you, (3) don’t worry, (4) learn another language (English if it is not your native tongue), (5) be aware of the world around you, (6) find balance in your professional, spiritual, and familiar obligations, (7) be entrepreneurial, (8) be critical, and (9) behave well in all areas of your life, and improve on yourself by learning from your mistakes. The underlying focus of these ten rules is to lead a successful life pursuing ethically beneficial goals. Of course, in all self-help literature the definition of “success” is contentious, and advice more often than not begs the question of how best to define one’s success. Huerta de Soto defines the term in the most straightforward manner: “to be successful in life is to be happy.”
- 5.
Everyone who knows Jesús will testify to his modesty and generosity. Not in vain, many contributors to these volumes wanted to tell several anecdotes at length about his personal warmth and support for them. Due to space constraints, the editors found themselves in the unenviable position as gatekeepers balancing the book’s physical constraints against the earnest wishes of its contributors.
- 6.
In his review of Money, Bank Credit, and Economic Cycles, Larry Sechrest complains that Jesús’s knowledge and use of foreign language sources, including English, Latin, Spanish, Italian, and French, although erudite and creditworthy, make some arguments difficult to confirm.
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Howden, D., Bagus, P. (2023). Jesús Huerta de Soto: An Appreciation. In: Howden, D., Bagus, P. (eds) The Emergence of a Tradition: Essays in Honor of Jesús Huerta de Soto, Volume II. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17418-6_1
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